Ciaran’s Peculier [sic] Blog

Obituaries are a means of paying tribute to someone’s life. They can take numerous styles. One the one hand there can be the panegyric, which extols the person, mentioning their positive achievements and traits. maybe at the expense of anything that might detract from their memory. This may sound insincere, but in Ireland we have always had great respect for the dead and it is not uncommon to here people remark, even about the greatest scoundrel, that he or she “wasn’t the worse of them”.

 Then there is the obituary which is nothing more than a hatchet job, and which can often be nothing more than a cowardly settling of scores. Many Irish nationalist, as well as left-wing politicians from throughout the world, have long experience of such obituaries being penned by ostensibly literate journalists and being published in so-called “quality” British newspapers.

 But let us return to the role of the obituary. It serves as a memorial for a life, no matter whether the subject was the most powerful or the least distinctive member of society. It appears at a sensitive time, when the individual has passed from this world to the next, leaving behind grieving relatives and friends.

 Let me mention now a third category of obituary, which I will name the Cavan obituary. It is the product of one particular individual whom I will not name, though anyone from Cavan will know who I mean. This author has such contempt for the subjects of the obituaries he pens that he cannot be bothered to find out anything about them, or to check whether the “facts” he reproduces are accurate. One might consider such an individual as quaint, had he any literary skill. In fact, he is possibly the worst writer on the planet for whom rules of grammar or syntax are mere external and unwelcome encumbrances. I know of no one who has a good word to say about him, even including his close relatives. He is a shining example of mediocrity.

 This figure had worked for many years in local journalism, where he had displayed his lack of writing ability and his particular élan for writing obituaries. His retirement had been greeted with universal joy. However, so bored by his retirement had he become that his former employer brought him out of retirement, to do what? Write obituaries.  One of the reasons I refer to Cavan society as perverse is that someone who is so manifestly incapable of performing a task is allowed to continue doing it, while others who could do it better are never given a chance. Perhaps they are expected to provide their efforts for free to such mediocrities in the hope that maybe one-day pigs might fly.

 People will take the above comments as further evidence of the anger of the “clever cripple” Ciaran Parker whose arrogance and impatience have been his undoing and who has therefore never tried to “play the game.” But perhaps I am arrogant; certainly I have no taste to play any games with such mediocre sportsmen. Although disability has prevented me from taking an active role in sport I have nevertheless participated in many sports as a passionate observer. For me sport and games are about skill. Essential, though, to any sport is a set of rules observed by all participants. The problem about the “games” played in Cavan and in Ireland is that the rules are changes frequently and arbitrarily, to insure that the “right” people always win.